In Remembrance
by unforgetabELLE
Summary: Adrien went back to his task at hand with an amused smile on his face, the sounds of his family echoing down the hall. His pen floated across the paper, but his hand froze when it came to the date. Double checking as his heart started to feel heavier in his chest. It was the day after the fifteenth anniversary of his mother's disappearance.


Adrien sat down in the varnished oak chair, its leather cushion supple and worn...and decorated with Princess stickers from Emilie's last home-makeover phase. Still smiling at the memory of peeling _Belle, Rapunzel & Friends_ off of nearly every surface in their house, he collected scattered papers on the desk and started to organize his mess.

Bills were piling up in the small office, and while Marinette usually took care of the general finances, the kids' tuitions were due in a week, and that came out of the trust fund from his father. Gabriel had definitely warmed to his wife, and Marinette's nonchalance when signing their prenup (and deliberate reminder to the fashion mogul of the sizable following and revenue her own brand made), had definitely helped, but no amount of fondness or respect mattered when it came to the security Agreste family fortune. Not even the trustworthiness or net worth of Adrien's spouse.

It hadn't mattered in the end. Marinette and Adrien had been a team long before they had married, and while navigating their new financial partnership had been a bit tricky, Marinette had lived simply her whole life, and Adrien had no desire to raise his family as lavishly as he had been. They'd figured it out. Marinette was definitely the breadwinner of the family, but Adrien pulled his weight with his meager teacher's salary, dipping into his inheritance only for the children's education when he and Marinette had come to the reluctant agreement that an international institution offered better security and educational opportunities for the twins. Even with the tuition, it didn't exactly even out the spending between the two parents, but as Marinette was eager to remind him, she hadn't married him for his money.

" _Are you brooding again?" she said once, catching him balancing the budget early in their marriage with a sullen pout._

" _No," he murmured unconvincingly, and Marinette just sighed, dropping whatever she was doing and unceremoniously plopping into his lap._

" _I didn't marry you for your money, chaton," she cupped his cheek with her palm. "To be honest, it was probably one of my biggest reservations."_

" _I know," he smiled down at her, more than cognisant about how nervous she'd been to marry into the Agreste empire, having to deal with all the publicity and unwanted attention that came with it. "But you chose me anyway."_

" _Yes, I did," she smiled warmly up at him before capturing his lips in a searing kiss. "Now stop distracting me and stop pouting." Marinette hopped off his lap even as he protested._

" _I still wasn't-" she turned and raised an eyebrow at him. The argument fell silent on his lips. "Your wish is my command, M'Lady."_

Trained now, and definitely _not brooding_ , Adrien went back to his task at hand with an amused smile on his face, the sounds of his family echoing down the hallway on the lazy Sunday night. His pen floated across the paper, filling out the amount in his carefully practiced script, but his hand froze when it came to the date. Double checking as his heart started to feel heavier in his chest, he looked up at the calendar on his computer for confirmation, mind spiraling as it did the math.

 _May 29, 2031_

His mother had disappeared on May 28, 2016.

He'd been 15 then.

He turned 30 last month.

Dropping the pen, oblivious to the way ink splattered across the half-written date on the check, Adrien sunk into the old wooden chair, his limbs limp as an unrecognizable feeling coursed through his veins. It was the day after the fifteenth anniversary of his mother's disappearance. He hadn't even noticed the date's passing.

It'd been raining the day before, and the kids were restless until he and Marinette had finally managed to settle them down for a movie. He'd called his father, and commiserated with Nino on the phone about their ruined plans for a day at the park with all the kids. Not once had he thought of the significance of the day. He'd thought of his mother, like he always did, but only small remembrances of how she love the smell of spring rain, or how Collette's smile was the spitting image of her missing grandmere. Nothing that bellied the importance of the day.

Nothing like the realization that he'd now lived more of his life without his mother than he had with her.

Adrien sat and waited for the grief to come again, but it didn't. He'd remembered the initial loss, the pain that was stalled in a time-warp of disbelief, before it finally hit him. He'd always heard grief came in waves, but never liked that analogy. Waves were predictable. His grief never had been. It was more like a strike of lightning despite the rain already having passed and the skies shining a clear blue. Even after the initial onslaught, Adrien would find himself struck with grief at the most inconsequential times. Stepping onto the metro. Staring out the window in history class. At a bar with friends. For years after she was gone, it would still hit him. The sensation would last only a moment and pass unbeknownst to anyone around him, but in that minute he was hyper aware of all he had lost. All the moments of his life his mother would never see.

Years went by, and the lightning struck less frequently, the moments were shorter, and a new sort of mourning took grief's place. Sad, but fond. Still, these moments seemed to find him at the most unexpected times.

It had always seemed unfair to him, that the mourning of her should come along with the most mundane of things. His mother deserved more than an errant tear while he was folding the girls' laundry or grading papers. She deserved to be remembered on days that it mattered. Like yesterday, the day he hadn't even realized the significance of until it was past.

He kept waiting for lightning to strike, but that wasn't how it worked. Even as he sat there, the hollow part of his heart reserved for his mother gaping with her absence, Adrien didn't cry. He might have forgotten the day, but he hadn't forgotten the woman. He'd seen her in the smile of his youngest and in the eyes of his oldest. He'd remembered her in the smell of Paris during a rainstorm and in the sounds of the piano medley in the elevator, the same tune she'd taught him when he was only five. He'd remembered her in the pictures lining the halls of the apartment she'd never see and in the love he had for his wife and his children, the same selfless love she'd taught him by example.

"Daddy?" The small stature of his oldest daughter-by seven whole minutes, she'd readily remind you-peeked into the office. His own green eyes stared at him questioningly out of a round face was was undoubtedly her mother's, as the little girl regarded her father. "What's wrong? Why are you sad?"

Adrien opened his arms and Emilie walked into the room and climbed onto his lap without question, hands placed on his shoulder as she scrutinized his expression. She might have had his eyes, but her uncanny perception was frighteningly similar to Marinette's.

"Nothing's wrong," he answered but his daughter looked at him with unconvinced eyes. "I was just remembering my maman."

"Grandmere Emmie?" Emilie's wide eyes blinked up at him and the hollow part of Adrien's heart felt fuller at the recognition he saw there.

"Yes," he whispered back with a smile.

"Grandpere talks about her a lot."

"Oh?" Adrien looked down at the little girl as she settled into the comfort of her father's arms. He and his father rarely spoke of his mother, and yet Emilie seemed quite familiar with her absent grandparent.

"She liked thunderstorms and cats, like me. And her favorite color was purple, like Colette," Emilie told him, her voiced colored with a smile. "It's good to remember."

Adrien smiled, his heart bolstered by the pieces of his mother that remained, in him and in his daughters, regardless of her physical presence or not. Adrien remembered her. Gabriel remembered her. And through them, his family remembered her, knew her, too.

In them, she lived on.

Adrien gathered the remarkable little girl who honored the woman's whose name she wore and kissed her soft head, knowing that fifteen years or fifty could pass, but his mother would live on in the lives she'd touched.

"Yes, it is good to remember."


End file.
